008: Failure Freedom

I often hear people tell me they’re afraid to try lettering because they might fail. Our brains fear the thought of failure to the extent that it literally stops people in their tracks. So many people never start something because they’re afraid.
Can you imagine if you never started chasing after a dream because of that fear of failure? In this episode, I am talking about what it really means to fail and why you need to take a step back to examine the expectations you have for yourself.
I explore how the real problem is often the story that your brain is telling you. I talk about why you should take a few minutes to play the “what if” game when you’re feeling fear and why giving yourself the permission and freedom to fail will bring you joy.
What you’ll find in this episode:
An invitation to create and indulge in 5 minutes of mindful creativity
What it really means to fail and why you should examine your expectations
Why you should play the “what if” game with yourself
Why you should remain committed to create
The joy of creating even when the thing you’re creating is imperfect
Read the transcript of the episode below:
I often hear people tell me that they are afraid to try lettering because what if they fail? What if, and what is failure, exactly? This is episode eight failure freedom.
Welcome to the committed to create podcast. I'm Lisa Funk, and I am so excited to hang out with you here. As we talk about the power of creating with our hands and our minds, I like to keep it real, remind you that you are not alone and share specific ways creativity and mindfulness can help us live even more meaningful and joyful lives.
I am so glad that you're here.
Hello. Welcome back to the podcast. This is episode eight and today we are going to be talking about failure freedom, and you might be thinking, what? Those two words do not go together in my book. Well, I'm hoping that after today you might feel a little bit more free when you think about failure, that it might not feel so scary.
It feels scary. Doesn't it? Okay, before we get started and really dive into this topic, I wanted to do a segment called invitation to create.
Today, I wanted to take a moment to invite you. Yes. You listening. You who thinks I'm not actually talking to you. I am talking to you. I want to invite you to create. In past episodes, I have talked about an invitation to do five minutes of mindful creation every day. And what that means is picking something to do that's creative without the pressure of it needing to be perfect without even worrying about anyone else seeing it. Or needing the product to be something you could sell or that's going to be like I've said before, hanging in a museum that is not the purpose of five minutes of mindful creativity. The point is to just get started to be present in the moment and to allow yourself to feel connected and to feel creative.
Now does this mean it can only be five minutes that you need to set a timer and you can't go beyond five minutes? No, if you end up going for an hour or longer or 20 minutes, or even if you only do it for one minute, it's all wonderful because it means that you're starting to think more about opportunities to create.
And you're starting to take those opportunities to just have a moment where you get to do that. Just have a moment to be present. And to utilize and tap into your creativity, if you aren't quite sure what to do for your five minutes or longer of mindful creativity, I wanted to suggest our course chalk art one oh one, because right now we are offering chalk art summer camp, along with it.
So when you buy chalk art one-on-one, you will also get all of the modules included in chalk art summer camp as well. It's a great course for beginners, if you don't consider yourself necessarily super creative, I think it's a great entry point. And it's also something that the whole family can enjoy together.
So you don't need to worry about locking yourself in a closet to do it on your own. Now, if you want to lock yourself in a closet to do it on your own, I totally support you. Just make sure you have enough space to have all your tools and your chalk board or whatever it is that you decide to do for your mindful creativity.
And again, it can be different every single day. I just want to give you the permission. That you can take a few minutes or even longer to create, and that it's going to bless your life and the lives of those around you.
All right. Now we are going to dive into the topic for today, which is failure freedom. And like I said, you may be wondering, what do these words have to do with each other? I don't feel very free when I think about failure, but I'm hoping that after today, you might not feel so afraid of it. I want you to feel free.
When you think about it because I teach lettering, people are often talking to me about their fear of starting and how they are afraid that they will fail. So, first of all, I had to look up the definition of failure. I found two definitions. One is lack of success. And the other is the omission of expected or required action.
And I think that these can kind of work together in the case of a hobby like lettering, you would want to take a look at what is the expected action. Because I think that that is what people determine as success, that if they get the expected action or the expected result, then that is success and that if they do not get the expected or required action or result, then that would be a lack of success or failure.
So to start with, we can examine what is our expectation. Is it realistic? Is it something that we want to hold on to? Is it serving us? When I teach about mindful creativity, I talk a lot about not expecting perfection and I also talk about expecting it to be terrible at first, because we often are terrible at things at first.
So a lot of our struggles that happen. A lot of the fear that we have is that we won't be perfect right away. When you think about that, it's like, oh my gosh, of course, I'm not going to be perfect right away. I'm not going to paint a van Gogh masterpiece my first time picking up a paint brush. But for some reason we had this idea that we maybe we will, maybe when I pick up those brush spins, It will look exactly like my teachers or my mentors or the person that I saw on Instagram.
Maybe that magic will just shoot out of my hand and I've got this kind of idea in my head and maybe it will just come out onto paper and we'll look super amazing. We kind of have that expectation. So it's really important to take a minute when we're worried about feeling when we're worried about starting to take a minute and think about what our expectation actually is.
And let's use lettering, for example, because that's my, that's my jam. If our expectation was that we're going to sit down the first time and that it's going to look exactly how, let's say, it looks for the person we're learning from. So let's use the example of lettering because that's what I do, that's my jam.
If your expectation, when you try lettering for the very first time, is that your lettering will be completely smooth. There will be no shakiness that the ink will just flow perfectly from the pen onto the paper and that your design will look just like it should be on a mug in target. You might be disappointed.
Right. But if you have the expectation that the first time you try your strokes will be very shaky and that you'll probably want to quit, that it won't look like the other designs that you're comparing yourself to. Then maybe you won't feel like a failure. So the expectation is very important, but let's go back for a moment to the first expectation, the expectation that our lettering will look absolutely flawless the first time that we try and that we will have perfect lettering right away.
That what if that is our expectation? So we give it a shot. We give it a try. And it doesn't, it doesn't look just like we thought that it would, or that we hoped it would. Where do we end up? We end up not having that perfect lettering. And guess what? I have a major spoiler alert for you. That is what is already happening.
The crazy thing is that our fear of failure has already come true if we don't try, we're afraid that we won't be good at lettering, but if you don't even try it, then you're already not good at it. What happens if you try and you're not good at it is that you end up exactly where you are right now without trying now, I believe with mindful creativity, that if we can.
Not necessarily completely remove the expectations because a lot of people would say that's impossible, but change the expectations. We can enjoy the process a lot more, but even if you wanted to keep that initial expectation of perfection, it is really helpful, I think, to realize that the worst that can happen is already happening right now if we don't try. The only thing that could be different is the story that you'll tell yourself about trying and not having it look the way that you want. So I always like to play the what if game again, with that initial expectation of perfection, if you tell me I'm afraid that it won't look right, I'm afraid that I won't be good at it right away.
And I say to you, okay, Let's play the what if game? What if you aren't good at it right away? What if? Then what? And then you get to fill in the blanks. I really want you to take a moment and think about this with something that you're afraid of trying something that you're afraid of attempting. What is your fear?
What are you afraid of happening or not happening? That you will mess up? The other people will judge you for not being good at it? And then what, okay. Say that happens, say that you try something and you aren't good at it right away. What do you make that mean? That in and of itself is not the problem.
The problem isn't that when we start lettering that we have some shaky strokes. The problem is the story or the thoughts that we tell ourselves when we have the shaky strokes or when the lettering doesn't look exactly like we hope it will, or the sewing that we did on the dress doesn't come out right. Or the painting looks different than we thought, whatever it is that we might be trying. It's the story that we tell ourselves when that happens. And we know that that's the problem. Because two people can do the same exact thing, they can both have shaky strokes on their first try with lettering and they will both feel completely differently depending on the story that they tell the thoughts that they're thinking that is what's going to make the difference and whether or not they feel like a failure.
What's crazy, is that when this happens to you, you don't think that it's optional to feel like a failure. You believe, we all do this. We believe that it is the truth, that we are a failure that we can never do anything right. That this always happens to me. And why did I get my hopes up and whatever you might be thinking.
You think that that is just how you're supposed to think and feel? We don't realize that our brain is coming up with these thoughts. We just think them and we feel really terrible. It doesn't feel good. So I think it's really important to play the, what if game so that we can discover what the story is that we're telling ourselves.
If we just keep saying, I'm just afraid of failing. I'm just afraid of failing. It's like putting a blanket statement of blanket fear. Over anything that we might be afraid of trying. We just say, I'm just afraid that I won't be good at it. And we leave it at that. And if you want to leave it at that, you totally can.
Of course. But if you want to get better at something or you want to enjoy something, did you know that you can enjoy things without being really good at them? I know it's hard to believe, but it's really true. In order to discover the thoughts and the story that you're thinking, it's really helpful to play the what if game?
So I want you to do that. I want you to think about something you're afraid of trying and play the, what if game and say. All right. What if it doesn't look exactly like I hope it will right away. What do I make that mean? And answer that for yourself. And I want to remind you from episode four, we talked about the brain, how it's your greatest tool for creating?
And we talked about how its function is to create thoughts for you. And it's going to create thoughts oftentimes based on how it is wired. Based on that motivational triad to seek pleasure, avoid pain and conserve energy. And this comes into play with failure because your brain is thinking, hold on, I'm supposed to seek pleasure.
This doesn't feel easy right away. So I think I'm out. And it also wants to avoid pain. And so it's going to think thoughts like. Hmm, this doesn't feel super comfortable. I am kind of embarrassed of my first tray, not interested. And it's also going to think about conserving energy. Is this going to be a waste of time?
What if I spend all of this time trying to learn a new skill and then I'm not even good at it? I don't think I want to do that. Knowing where these thoughts are coming from is so helpful because we realize this is completely normal. You are a human who has been wired to think this way. It's completely normal.
Now, do you want to continue on thinking that way? Do you want to continue to be afraid or do you want to feel free and have failure? Freedom. I also want to add that we didn't even think of the option that we might actually be good at something or enjoy it. When we're thinking about failure, we focus so much on the fear of failure, the how terrible it's going to feel that we don't even think about what if we happen to either be good at it right away, which is of course what everyone dreams of. And that is not super realistic. Or what if we keep putting in the effort and enjoy the process. And have a good time. We don't even give that equal airtime. We spend all of our time thinking about how horrible it will feel if we're not good at it. And then we start telling the story of how we're never good at anything, and we don't have any talents and everyone else is so talented except for us.
I have told this story many times, this was the story that I told myself and other people throughout high school. I don't know why this was my thing. I always would say, I just don't have my cup of tea. I just don't have my thing. Oh, how I wish I could go back and talk to her, that teenage Lisa, I wish I could talk to her so badly and tell her what was in her future, for one.
But that was a story that she was telling herself and that she was telling other people as well. And it's so natural and normal to tell ourselves these stories. But I want to tell you, there is nothing wrong with you. Your brain just creates thoughts. That's its function, and those thoughts create your feelings and create your reality.
So when you feel disappointed or feel like a failure, It is only because of the thoughts and the story that your brain is producing for you. And most of the time that's on default. Most of the time we aren't paying attention to this brain, this tool that we have, we aren't watching what it's doing. We're just feeling the effects of it.
So we noticed that we're feeling afraid of failure. Well, we don't think about why. And if we do think about why we blame it on the circumstance and we say that, well, of course, I'm going to feel terrible if I don't get it right away, but we know that that's not true because some people that don't get it right away, don't feel that way.
Okay. The point is not to compare yourself to other people who are just always determined and don't get discouraged. No. You're going to get discouraged. Sometimes you're going to feel frustrated, but the powerful part of it is to know that that is coming from your thoughts. It's coming from the thoughts your brain is creating that your brain is doing to try to keep you safe.
But it's keeping you from creating and growing and learning in the ways that you really want to. So now I am going to tell you the key, we already talked about changing your expectations, but what we are doing when we change our expectations is that we are telling ourselves a different story. We are changing our thoughts, and that is part of mindful creativity.
When we changed the way that we think we can have a different feeling if I think, oh my gosh, I'm so nervous. I don't know if I'm going to be good at this. When we change that to thinking, I probably won't be very good at this the first time. And that's okay. Or I believe that I can enjoy this, even if I'm not good at it, or I can keep working at this. And I know that I'll get better. A lot of our thoughts and our story that we tell ourselves, come from our past experiences that we feel we're failures and the stories and the thoughts that we have about those. So when we want to start to think differently about failing in the future, we can begin by changing the narrative that we have about quote unquote failures from the past.
There are two really common trains of thought here with failure. One is that some people want to say there is no such thing as failure, only learning. And if that serves you go with it. When you look at your past and you say, you know what? I didn't fail. I just learned a way that didn't work right. That famous Einstein quote.
Or there are lots of people that believe that it is okay to fail, that it's important to fail. And that, that is how we grow and progress. And that if we are so wimpy about not wanting to fail, that we won't have the experiences that we want to have, that we won't allow ourselves to try new things and to develop new skills that are really enjoyable and fun in our lives.
In my opinion. It doesn't really matter if you call it failure. Or if you say that you love failure, because either way, they're going to be times when our actions don't meet our expectations and you can decide what serves you best, the words that feel right to you, the phrases that help you to feel committed to creating.
There we go. There's the name of the podcast committed to create. I want you to be committed, to create. No matter what happens, and I'm not telling you to never feel afraid or to never feel frustrated or to never feel discouraged. What I want to tell you is that when you understand that it's your brain, that's coming up with the thoughts that are causing you to feel that way. It's much easier to come back from it. It's much easier to decide how you want to feel and the phrases and thoughts that are going to help you to get the result that you want. And I just want you to remember that the fear of doing it wrong is keeping us from the joy of doing it. Period. 
I truly believe that there is joy in creating, even when it's imperfect and for a lot of people, there's joy, definitely when they're doing it well, but we're not even giving ourselves the chance to learn how to do it. Well, if we don't start, if we don't try, if we don't give it a chance, most of us have some set of rules, some dialogue in our head.
It's really helpful to think about. Who has made up these roles? Is that something that we learned when we were young? Is that something that we've heard other people say, because we get to decide the rules. We get to decide what our expectations are and that even when we don't meet those expectations, even when we lower the expectations a ton, and we don't even meet those, we get to decide what that means for us.
Our kids are, now, I feel like a lot of our kids are learning a lot about growth mindset. And I remember one day my son came home from school. He was in kindergarten, cutie, little five-year-old and he told me mom, guess what? I learned the power of yet? I don't say I'm not good at it. I say, I'm not good at it yet.
And I was like, oh my goodness, I cannot tell you how many adults have not learned the power of yet. I want you to know that even if you're not good at something yet, you can still enjoy it on the way. And that if you keep trying and learning and practicing that you likely will most likely will get better and improve and maybe then it will be even more enjoyable for you.
I also want you to think about how fearing failure could be keeping you safe. By just putting that blanket statement on lots of different things saying, oh, I'm just afraid to try. I don't think I'll be good at it. How is that keeping you safe? Because when we are going to move past that, when we are going to have failure freedom, we need to have some reasons we need to know why we want to move past it, why we want to be okay with it.
Why we want to be free to fail. Are your reasons strong enough? I was asking my daughter about this today because I said, you know, a lot of people tell me that they're afraid of failure when it comes to lettering. They're afraid of failing. She's 10 years old. And she said to me, that's so silly. There's no failing in lettering. It's all just unique. 
Of course, I teach tutorials. I teach different styles. I teach you all kinds of different tips, but what if you could believe that your lettering might not look like what I am demonstrating and that maybe it's not even supposed to, or that you can enjoy it and embrace it for what it is, even if it looks different from the example. 
As we wrap up, I want to remind you that one of the great powers of mindful creativity is changing our expectations. I have heard from so many of you who send me messages saying thank you so much for giving me the permission to create and not expect it to be perfect. I am giving all of you that permission right now and forever that you can create whatever you want, that it doesn't need to be perfect and that you can enjoy it.
Even when it doesn't meet your expectations. Yes, we do try to lower the expectations to start with. We do try to expect things to be terrible when we're first starting, but even if they don't meet those lowered expectations, we can keep going. We can enjoy it. We can believe that it's possible to have a meaningful experience with creativity, even when it's not something that we really are excited to show the entire world right away.
So in review, I want to remind you of a few things that we talked about. One is to play the, what if game in order to see what the story and the thoughts are. That might be holding you back. When you think about failing, when you think about not measuring up to your expectations, ask yourself what if I don't, what then? Play that what if game all the way through so that you can see, what is it that you're actually afraid of? Then I want you to remember that your brain is wired to seek pleasure, avoid pain and conserve energy. And it's creating those thoughts that are causing you that fear, that frustration and that discouragement and that's okay.
Your brain is just doing its best, but you have the ability to rewire those thoughts. To come up with new beliefs that you want to have, that will help you push past those uncomfortable feelings and push to the mindful creativity where you can be present, where you can be compassionate about your creativity, where you can be accepting and loving.
And I know I've said this before, but I'm going to say it again. I believe that when we can become more compassionate about our creativity, we are becoming more compassionate about ourselves. When I can be nice to what I'm putting on the page and not beat myself up for it and critique it and tear it apart that I'm also learning how to show compassion and kindness to myself as well.
I have had years of negative dialogue where I was really, really mean to myself. And it showed whenever I tried to create something. And as I have learned how to be kinder to what I'm creating, I have also learned to be kinder to myself. My inner dialogue has completely changed. I've become more aware of my thoughts and the story that I'm telling.
And I have been able to enjoy creativity and enjoy myself so much more. I hope that that can happen for you as well. 
Before I head out, I wanted to share a review with you. I'm so grateful for all of your reviews on iTunes. If you leave a review and I read it here, you get a free online course. So if this is your review, send me an email at hello@handlettereddesign.com.
Today's review is from Bolivian mamma. She says very applicable: Lisa's podcasts are excellent and apply to everyone because even though you might not have the same struggles she does, we all struggle with something. Ain't that the truth. We all have low points in our lives, and that's when we really need something that will lift us up and refocus us doing something for yourself that nourishes your soul is always a good thing to do. And that's the message of her podcast. 
Thank you so much for that. Email me. And you can pick out any of our online courses. Again, if you are interested in trying out chalk art one oh one, which is an incredible course that teaches you all about chalkboards and how to create beautiful designs for any of you that are interested right now during the summer, we are throwing in an additional course called chalk art summer camp.
It's so much fun, and I think it's something you would enjoy with your whole family. You can check that out at hand lettered design.com. You can also get all of the show notes from this episode at committedtocreate.com. And I just want to thank you for not only leaving reviews and posting about it on your Instagram, the podcast, but also when you choose to just tell a neighbor or tell a friend or a sister or someone that you think might enjoy it.
My goal is to help everyone feel less alone and more inspired to create a life that they love. Thanks for being here. And I will talk to you next week.
Links:
Chalk Art 101 Online Course
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008: Failure Freedom

Podcast

046: Removing the Pressure

045: Creative Constraint
